No time no time....

This has been very bad week for me in terms of finding free time. I think it's the first time since last 2 months or so that I have failed to update the blog for a week.

Not much time right now also. Got to study. Exams.

Aditya

Finally stage one passed....

I am very happy that my oral exams are finally over... well the internals are. The externals will begin from the 18th and go on till the 26th.

Sorry people. Not enough time to update the blog.

Keep in touch...

Aditya Shevade

Oral exams, Practical exams... submissions.... No time to wrote blog....

Well the title says it all. I have got practical and oral exams from today till 20th. So I may not be able to update the blog with the same frequency as was in the last month. I am not even able to finish the website of mine. And it is getting delayed day by day. Please, all of my loyal readers, don't stop reading....

Just as a sneak peak, I have to design and code a library management program in C++. And that is consuming most of my time on the computer.

I will still try to write a review about openSUSE desktop experience with Gnome tomorrow if I get free time, but that seems highly unlikely. Please be patient. I will be back. B-)

Aditya Shevade

I am ill.....

Hey all of you 'readers of my blog' (thought that it might look/read good) out there.... I am ill. Suffering from cold, cough and a little fever.

That is why, I won't be able to post much soon. Seeya when I get better. Till then, enjoy the earlier posts of mine.

Aditya Shevade

The truth about engineering that I am going through....

This is getting worse day by day. I have thought many times and even had decided that I will not have a go at submissions from now on. But the way they frustrate me and all..... it's too much for me to handle.

Not much time to discuss more now. A detailed post on this subject will soon come. But, for the moment, what I am thinking is, the only things I have been learning in this engineering course are that,

• You must be very good at writing. Or copying from others notebooks. If you are not, then you cannot survive.
  
• It does not matter if you have understood the subject. You can write whatever you want and still get marks.
• It does not matter if you don't have any skill other than mugging up and writing it down. These two make up for brains, understanding, ability to analyze things, coming up with ideas and much more. Actually, almost everything.
• There is nothing as, how, why, what like questions. Everything is as it is being presented in the books. You either mug it up and score or you get out or fail.

As I said, there is much more and with evidence, but I have to sleep now... Have slept only 4 hours out of last 30 odd....

Aditya Shevade

Another T-shirt Design.....

Hey... I got some good response to my Linux T-Shirt (from my friends, not on the blog... :-) and :-()

Here is another design.

I have embedded this picture into the shirt which gives me :-

Aditya Shevade

Design Demystified......

Had a great weekend. And because of that I was not able to post much about it. Me and my partner came second in a circuit design contest.

It was arranged by the Electronics Engineering Students Association on University level. And the circuits given to us were.

• Design an XOR gate using IC 7400 (NAND TTL).
• Design 4 bit Adder Subtracter using IC 7483 (4 bit Adder) and IC 7486 (TTL XOR).
• Design BCD adder by modifying the above circuit.

Now, we finished the first two stages. And the first team designed the third circuit on paper but did not build it. So we came second. Still I am happy. Especially after that C debugging contest where we did not get a prize even after coming third. :-(

But, this was good. The only fact is that there were only 6 teams. :-| And the winners were having the degree of Diploma in Electronics. So, I am still happy that we were first among those who have joined this degree course after doing 12th.

Nothing much. Got a nice shield, some 200/- and a certificate (the most important... it actually mentioned that we came second.... refer debugging C...). Apart from this, I have taken a recording, visual one, on the mobile of my partner after the completion. I will soon post it, but first I have to get it.

Aditya Shevade

Had a lot of work and sleep to do......

Hey... nothing much to write today as I spent the most of the day while sleeping. Watched the Dreamers a bit. Can't say good or bad. Then there were some guests for dinner. And then there was submission as usual....

Nice work by Michael Clarke, hopefully Australia's captain to be, scoring a hundred. Bad rain.... Saved a point for India and lost one for my team...

Gotta sleep now. Have a circuit design competition tomorrow morning at 8:30. Kudos....

Aditya Shevade

I completely forgot......

To write about how this day went.... As usual, I went to the college and wasted my time in doing stupid practicals on those breadboards. I hate them, the wires keep coming out and that is a real pain in the a** when working on a big circuit, and the part that even sucks more is that we don't have any big circuits to work on... Anyways, then had a couple of off lectures...

After that, we had a meeting about the discussions related to a T-Shirt that we are going to launch. Of our batch of electronics. So, we were chatting and a group 'X' was against my friend (mentioned in the legendary chat) and my choice of design. We had been working on it from our group, say 'Y' for long time. And we were not going to change it just cause 'X' said so.

We showed them a big thumb and said, 'Suggestions come with a responsibility', so if you want to suggest, make sure that the thing actually pays off. And upon hearing this, the 'X' group accepted all that we had suggested, the color, the design, the format... everything.

You might have guessed, but in case not, then this 'X' group was all the girls in our batch and 'Y' was we boys.

Morale of the story :- We are a couple of bigheads who thought that we were doing a good work for the class. But in the end it turned out that brutal refusal and a little frustrated anger was all that we needed.....

A classic chatroom conversation......

I was chatting with this friend of mine. He has asked me not to reveal his name, so I will say me for myself and replace his name by my own, Aditya. So I was having this conversation with Aditya.

As usual, he posted a scrap in my scrapbook in Orkut, asking me to join Ricky Ponting hate club. I love Ricky Ponting. So, I went on a rampage against him..... It was funny, take a look....

me: scrap

12:13 AM HAD

Aditya: :)

me: no wonder most of the members are from India

12:14 AM I don't see any outsiders.

typical.....

:-|

12:15 AM Aditya: how ca n ther be outsiders because they always support thir players,they r loyal and as our population is big ,people like u support outsiders

12:16 AM me: I am not talking only about Aussies

why not any english people?

siuth africans maybe?

12:17 AM ever wondered why there are no new zealanders ?

Aditya: maybe they r neutral

me: yeah

actually SA is supposed to be like Pakistan for Australia

enemies forever

12:18 AM but they don't say that they hate Aussies

Aditya: and ponting lways such crap thngs only about india not about other countries

me: they either support their team.... or they stay Neutral

and your knowledge about Australian cricket team is not good enough

Ponting says these things before every series

and even others

Aditya: i dont care about it

12:19 AM me: remember the substitute filder issue?

in ashes?

remember him fighting against SA?

no

you will not

cause you only know one thing. You like India and you hate Aussies

and that is a typical Indian supporter

12:20 AM and you will never care

cause you know

that you don;t have facts to prove what you say

Aditya: xcuse iam not aussies only ponting

me: facts gathered from search

OK

Ponting

replace Aussies by Ponting

and read all sentences

they are still true

12:21 AM you keep supporting India

Aditya: read what symond said

me: don't say a word against him unless you have proof

again, you said Ponting

not roy

roy is Symonds

Aditya: read wht ponting said

me: I know

he did

so what

it's a mind game

12:22 AM and as I said, Indians are too polite for their own good

Aditya: he shud show his game on grnd

me: and even I am like that

Aditya: it is not

me: he has been shwoing his game

he is No1 batsman

in tests since 2005 DEC

currently at number one in ODI ranking

12:23 AM he still reains the best captain in the world

Aditya: his language might be different if aussies shuld have won wold cup

me: he has earned the right to speak

and he will do that

no

see after 2003 W/C

or, as Aussies say, they prefer ashes over W/C

Aditya: every player has his gud and bad days

me: and, he spoke like this after this years ashes win

12:24 AM he is having good days

Aditya: and ponting is having gud days

me: and he is speaking now

maybe when he wil have bad days

he will not speak

right now

he speaks cause he has earned that

aapan bolato te kon print karat nahi

but he has reached that level

12:25 AM proved himself

Aditya: he has been speeking like this

me: look what they did after Champions Troffy

that is how they arer

aggresive

and I love that

Aditya: is sachin not proved himself

me: and, as I said, I regret that I am not like them

so... no one is stopping Sanchin from speaking

12:26 AM Aditya: hw can all teams be aggresive

me: it's his choice if he wants to or not

who said all teams should be aggresive?

Aditya: no i thnk one shud kno enough wht one shud speak or not

12:27 AM then i like indian attitude

me: and he has not spoken anything bad

Aditya: and u like aussies one

me: I don't see anyone but the indians complaining

yeah that is the point

I like them

Aditya: even they cant praise other team for others victory

me: you like India

so, what I am saying is that

12:28 AM you support your team

I will support mine

don't post I hate them things to me

Aditya: none wl change his side so change the topic

It was over after that and we spoke about usual Submission, the class T-Shirt and other stuff.... Gotta go now, still chatting with him....

Aditya Shevade

Now I am officially a nocturnal animal.....

Bahh.... it has been 3 days and I have not had sleep for more than 5 hours. I have been awake till minimum 3am and then I have college at 9am so I MUST wakeup at 8am.

This submissions stuff is really bad. It is getting on my nerves. I have to write about 200 pages with diagrams and graphs before the start of next week. And I am very slow at writing. It would have been much better if printouts were allowed. My typing speed is greater than my writing speed.

It is not going to be easy. I also have participated in two contests. One is a mobile movie making contest and then a circuit design contest, the subjects of both will be given on the spot. And it is going to take entire weekend. And I am again going to have to stay up long.

Off I go now, must sleep in order to be awake during the lectures....

Aditya Shevade

Yes.... Driving License.....

Finally, I got free time today and I bunked 2 lectures to give my driving tests. You would know if you are from India, or have seen anyone give a test in India, in small cities, then you would know that this so called test is just a formality.

But finally I did give it and as you might have guessed, passed it as well. So I am waiting now for the permanent license to reach my hands. And then... I will start terrorizing people on highways.... (Not actually, my driving is good).

Aditya Shevade

God help my college..... and unuversity.....

I never thought that I would come to hate the people at our college this much. The reason, they are still living in the 90's.

I just found out that each and every PC in our college, running Windows has Turbo C/C++ 3.0. Build 1990.

The compiler it has, does not know 'iostream' it does not know 'namespace's concept. And this sucks. Even many of the PCs running Linux use Red Hat 9. They don't know other Linux flavors. And there is not a single mac in the lab.

Disgusting.

Aditya Shevade

Due to one reason or another.....

As usual, you would have guessed that I have not written any journal yet. I am falling back... I have a headache. For reason, consult the last post.

Right now, I am feeling a bit ( a lot) bored. So I am just writing stuff here.... Aaahh.... it's no use...

Aditya Shevade

My debbugging skills were tested by a system with bugs........

Today, I had to wake up at 7am for the programming contests. And doing that after a short sleep of 5 hours is not enough. But I finally woke up. Then in the college, me and my partner reported at the reception. Then we were given an MCQ paper each for debugging C code and general coding competition. The first impression that paper left on me was.... BAD. scaling 2/10 on the scale of quality. It was based on Borland compiler and Turbo C/C++. Which violate the ISO standards of C. Like 'void main()' which is not allowed. And use of 'getch()' and 'clrscr()' which are not a part of standard library functions.

I am not against those functions, but the contest was a C contest. Not Borland C contest. If I ever use 3rd party libraries, I use documentation. I cannot mug everything up. And so, the papers were poor. I even wrote Turbo C sucks on the question paper, which was submitted later. :-)

We ( me and my partner) were selected. He did most of the work related to Borland.... And I was providing a few logical answers.

After that we had to go through a series consisting of 5 levels. It was very good. Nothing related to Borland. All based on ISO C. There were folders locked containing problem statements. And we were given passwords once we finished the preceding level. (They were also checking the code so no point in cheating there...).

We were doing great until the last stage. Where we took about 25-30 minutes in debugging. And finished in about 1:15hours. We were the third to finish. Then there was judging. We were asked some questions based on the changes made in the code. We did very well scoring 09, 10, 10, 07, 10 in the 5 levels. Scoring 46/50. Our hopes were high. We went to the second event in that heat.

We had to code 2 programs there. Both were mathematical functions. We finished the first one quite well. And even finished the second one, but with problems in multiple inputs. In short, we did not finish the second one properly as asked. But the first one, we did. And then while judging, the judge asked, why we had not allocated the memory. Frankly speaking, I have no idea about thing thing in C. Called 'malloc()'. I only know 'new' and 'delete'. So, I let my partner speak. But he (judge) was not convinced. And he left saying that program will crash for sure. But it did not. Anyways...

So, back to prize distribution. We had our hopes high. But we were not chosen. Only 2 prizes were given and we were third. OK, they wanted to give prizes to only 2 teams. Fine. But at least write that we were third on the certificate that you (they) are giving me. But no. They gave us a certificate of participation. :-| ...

We checked with the judges and found that the first team had scored 47. The second had scored 45. And we had 46. But, as the second team finished earlier (about 25-30 mins) before us, they were declared runner ups.

No complaint there. We were slow and we had to pay the prise. BUT, even Olympics have 3 medals. At least they could have given a certificate for 3rd number......

Aditya Shevade

I have to tell this to someone....

I am writing this post because of the last post which I had to erase due to some reasons. I cannot hold it off anymore. Read for yourself....

This is it. Today I have decided it.... I am
confused. Why do people behave like that with me? Anyways.

The
trouble I am having is because of the fact that Aussies lost. To tell the truth,
I don't care. But it's the people who always tease me. And I hate that. And it
gives me trouble, and so this thing happens (I get mad).

If only
people would stop teasing me, they would know that I really don't care who wins
and who loses. Cause I just support them. It does not mean that I will kill
someone if they lost. But just to get rid of the teasing thing I do a lot of
stupid things. And it gets me in trouble.

I have decided, no more
'fanboy'ism in these kind of things. I am better off with SuSE Vs Ubuntu or Linux
Vs Windows. (and mac :-D).

Huh... it feels good once I have got it
all out.

Aditya Shevade

... I hate....

I hate *********************************.....

Content censored. For reasons contact me....

Waiting for the big game..... And to get flamed.....

Aah.... This is it. The moment of truth. India Vs My (Favorite) Team. I mean Australia. The last time these 2 teams clashed in a World Cup, Indians were thrashed by the bat of Ponting and then the Bowl of McGrath by removing Tendulkar.

But this is not a 50 over match. Ponting is not there, so is McGrath. So the task is a little difficult for the Aussies. And, Indian team has got the ideal people for T20. Many are there with almost NIL test and ODI experience. So it's gonna be a big match. I wish that Aussies will again repeat the history and thrash India.

Now back to the flaming part. I am again behind on my submissions. I wasted the whole week sleeping and stumbling. StumbleUpon is the best and the worst thing to have happened with my internet life (If you know what I mean ;-)).

So, I have to write about a 100 pages with diagrams and thats not cool. Thats bad. And I hate when something like this happens. But again, as usual I am here writing a blog post. And as I already mentioned, I am not even sure that even 10 people read it in a month. (And you have blogs with more that 1000 hits a day). That is not the point however. I know I am not a very good writer and maybe most people hate my writing and the way I write. But the point is that even though I have to write all this, I am here writing blog.

This has to change (Don't worry, I am not going to stop writing). I must find a way....

Aditya Shevade

My Style of Learning ..... Visual / Non Verbal.....

I was just taking a test on DVC Learning Styles to checkout my learning style. This is what I found.

The results of Aditya Shevade's learning inventory are:

Visual/Nonverbal 40 Visual/Verbal 32 Auditory 18 Kinesthetic 32

Your primary learning style is:

The Visual/ Nonverbal Learning Style

You learn best when information is presented visually and in a picture or design format. In a classroom setting, you benefit from instructors who use visual aids such as film, video, maps and charts. You benefit from information obtained from the pictures and diagrams in textbooks. You tend to like to work in a quiet room and may not like to work in study groups. When trying to remember something, you can often visualize a picture of it in your mind. You may have an artistic side that enjoys activities having to do with visual art and design.

Learning Strategies for the Visual/ Nonverbal Learner:

Make flashcards of key information that needs to be memorized. Draw symbols and pictures on the cards to facilitate recall. Use highlighter pens to highlight key words and pictures on the flashcards. Limit the amount of information per card, so your mind can take a mental "picture' of the information.

Mark up the margins of your textbook with key words, symbols, and diagrams that help you remember the text. Use highlighter pens of contrasting colors to "color code" the information.

When learning mathematical or technical information, make charts to organize the information. When a mathematical problem involves a sequence of steps, draw a series of boxes, each containing the appropriate bit of information in sequence.

Use large square graph paper to assist in creating charts and diagrams that illustrate key concepts.

Use the computer to assist in organizing material that needs to be memorized. Using word processing, create tables and charts with graphics that help you to understand and retain course material. Use spreadsheet and database software to further organize material that needs to be learned.

As much as possible, translate words and ideas into symbols, pictures, and diagrams.

Comments :-

Completely Agreed. I cannot say much here. But if you meet me in private, then.....

Aditya Shevade

I think my brain is corrupting.....

Ahh... This is nuts. I was playing sudoku, easy level on websudoku. And, my average time, after solving 18 games is 8 minutes. Where it should have been somewhere around 5 - 5.5 minutes.

I think all this duration, where I have not been solving any aptitude level exams, has caused my brain to become inactive. I must do something.

One more thing. Another challenge given to me. Do the swapping thing mentioned in the post I wrote yesterday, in one line, without making use of brackets. And the hint given is, make use of bitwise operators. As I already said, I cannot figure this one out. Not right now. Have a headache. Did not sleep yesterday night. So, I am off to sleep now.

One more thing I have been wondering lately is, which language I should learn now that I have completed C and C++. Python, PHP or Java? Can someone please suggest?

Aditya Shevade